Various specialized instruments are presently available to the surgeon for performing various cuts in the cornea as required by surgery and/or trephination of the cornea. Thus, one such keratotomy serves to make rediary incisions that are used, in particular, for correcting myopia (short sight). Another is designed to perform incisions that are transverse to a meridian of the cornea, preferably in the form of circular arcs, for the purpose of correcting astigmatism. There also exists an apparatus for trephination of the cornea for transplanting purposes.
The most common need of an ophthalmological surgeon is an instrument for surgical correction of astigmatism. This need is satisfied at present only by one of the instruments outlined above which are complicated and thus expensive and which are relatively difficult to handle.
The invention seeks to provide a much simpler instrument for making corneal incisions that are orthogonal to a meridian and that are preferably arcuate so that the incision relates to a zone of the cornea that is of substantially constant thickness. The simplicity of the instrument makes it possible to reduce the cost thereof very significantly, thereby making it available to a much larger number of practitioners.